Also, President Trump and his team have been pushing hard on his tax plan. 4,000 pay raise. Former treasury secretary Larry Summers says the claims from the white house are more dishonest than any he has ever seen before. He explains. The white houses Kevin Hassett defends himself. And the mona lisa, the last supp supper, and yes, the flying man, all creations of the extraordinary mind of one extraordinary man, leonardo da vinci. What can we learn from leonardo . A lot says Walter Isaacson. First, heres my take. While news and analysis in america continues to be obsessed with Donald Trumps daily antics and insults, halfway around the world something truly historic just happened. China signalled that it now sees itself as the worlds other super power, positioning itself as the alternative if not rival to the United States. This is not my opinion based on reading the tea leaves of chinese politics. It is the clearly articulated view of chinas supreme leader, xi jinping. In his speech to congress, xi declared that china is entering a new era that will be marked by the country becoming a role model for political and Economic Development and a mighty force in the world. He asserted that chinas political system is a great creation that offers a new choice for other countries, and he insisted that the country will defend its interest zealously while also becoming a Global Leader on issues as far ranging as Climate Change and trade. Ever since china abandoned its isolation in the 1970s, its guiding philosophy was set by dung ping. China needed to learn from the west, especially the United States. According to dung, it should be humble and modest in its Foreign Policy, hide its slight under a bushel and bide its time. But the time has now come, it appears, and he said the middle kingdom is ready to take center stage in the world. Xis speech is important because this Party Congress made clear he is no ordinary leader. He ascended to a second term in Office Without naming any obvious successors from the next generation of party officials. Thus maintaining a grip on power far more secure than his immediate predecessors. More important, the party enshrined his thoughts in the constitution, an honor previously accorded only to dung in his lifetime. This means that for the rest of his life, xi and his ideas will dominate the party of china. Chinas new stance toward the world and the way it has been received are in part because of the continued strength of the Chinese Company and the growing political confidence of the party under xi. But it is also against the back drop of the total collapse of political and moral authority of america in the world. A recent Pew Research Center survey charts a 14point drop in u. S. Favorability across the more than 30 countries polled. Countries like australia, the netherlands and canada now all have a more favorable view of china than of the u. S. Many of the countries surveyed including germany, chile and indonesia have greater confidence in the leadership of xi than of trump. China has aggressively sought to improve its image in the world, spending billions on foreign aide, promising trade in investment and opening con fushs institutes to promote chinese culture. Meanwhile, consider how the United States must now look to the rest of the world. It is politically paralyzed, unable to make major decisions. Politics has become a branch of reality tv with daily insults, comebacks and color commentary. Americas historic leadership role in the world has been replaced by a narrow and cramped ideology. Foreign policy itself has become a partisan game with washington breaking international agreements, shifting course and reversing policy almost entirely to score political points at home. The shift in reputation that we are witnessing around the world is not so much about the rise of china but rather, the decline of america. For more, go to cnn do. Com fare and read my Washington Post column. Now lets get started. You have likely heard the phrase the magnitsky act before. That is the act that targets top russian oligarchs and officials, putins closest aides, denying access to western visas and opportunities. It is the action that the government once repealed and what the russians who met the Trump Campaign wanted to talk about. Bill browder who had once been the largest foreign investor in russia, is the driving force behind that role. Now the russians have fought back. Interpol has now blocked that warrant and mr. Browder is again free to travel. He joins me today from london. Welcome, bill. Good to see you. First explain the timing of this decision. Why this week . Well, last week was a very important week in that canada passed the canadian version of the magnitsky act to impose visa sanctions and asset freezes on the people who killed my lawyer, Sergei Magnitsky, and the people who do similar abuses in russia and around the world. And putin went crazy over there. When i say he went crazy, we actually got a chance to see a video of him giving a speech in which he spent about five minutes talking about how angry he was with me. And roughly on the same day as that was all happening, putin added me to the interpol arrest warrant system, and on that same day, my u. S. Visa was blocked. Thankfully, the u. S. Quickly senator john mccain and senator Benjamin Cardin quickly intervened and a few hours later the department of Homeland Security issued me a new visa, and thankfully interpol has also blocked russias arrest warrant. So im back to normal. But its pretty dramatic and its pretty clear that putin is not a happy man about me today. Explain why canadas passing the magnitsky act is so important, because the u. S. Has this law but the fear i think that the russians that is that will spread throughout the western world, correct . So what the magnitsky act does is it freezes assets and bans visas of human rights abusers in russia and elsewhere. Putin doesnt like this because hes a very rich man. Hes got, in my estimation, 200 billion of net worth. Hes probably the richest man in the world. Hes afraid that that money will be frozen. So he initially lashed out at the american magnitsky act, but whats more concerning for him is that as the magnitsky act gets replicated in other countries, there will be no place for him to hide and his money wont be safe. And putin is particularly mad about canada because canada is seen as a totally neutral, honest broker, moral leader type of country. People can say, well, america is a big super power and other countries may not want to follow a super power, but nobody has any bad feelings theres no such thing as anticanadianism. Resu as a result of that i believe and i think putin believes that there will be now a domino effect of other countries passing the magnitsky act. And to remind people, this was the issue that has been brought up by the russian lawyer and the former intelligence operative from russia when they met with donald trump jr. , jared kushner, Paul Manafort, when they met with the Trump Campaign, correct . Exactly. So putin has been really upset about this. It was his number one Foreign Policy priority to get rid of the magnitsky act. He had through various proxies and intermediaries he came to the United States and other countries but they came to the United States to make sure that this thing wasnt going to get implemented, maybe get repealed, and as one of those intermediaries went in, this woman, this russian lawyer, and this russian spy, and those are the two people on june 9, 2016 right after trump was nominated, the republican nominee, they went to trump tower and met with jared kushner, donald trump jr. And Paul Manafort and went in with one very specific ask which was to repeal the magnitsky act. Theres no question that thats what they were asking for because theres actually now documentary evidence of that. The only question that everybody has is what was going to be offered in return. To understand the russian allegation, it is that you were complicit in the murder of your lawyer who died in a russian prison when you were not even in russia. So how did you what is the charge . How could that have happened . Its about the craziest thing ive ever seen. Theyre saying that i murdered Sergei Magnitsky from london somehow, and they said i did so in conjunction with an unidentified mi6 agent, being the secret service of britain. And they somehow believe that i was able to pull strings in all of the russian Justice System to have him killed in a russian prison. What makes it more absurd is that i then spent the next 8 years fighting for justice and passing sanctions against russia to get justice for Sergei Magnitsky. Its the most crazy, cockamamie allegation that could ever be made, and in a certain sense what it shows to me is that weve really gotten under Vladimir Putins skin, that hes kind of lost it. Hes been mad for a long time and theyre just now doing crazy stuff, and this is the craziest of all the crazy stuff theyve done. Bill browder, always a pleasure to have you on. Great to see you. Next on gps, how would you like 4,000 extra in your pocket . Thats what the Trump Administration says it is offering in its tax plan. But should you believe it . The former treasury secretary, former president of harvard, Larry Summers, versus the white houses kevin has let. Tired of wrestling with seemingly impossible cleaning tasks . Using wipes in the kitchen, and sprays in the bathroom can be ineffective. Try mr. Clean magic eraser. Simply add water, and use in your kitchen for burnt on food, in your bathroom to remove soap scum, and on walls to remove scuffs and marks. It erases 4x more permanent marker per swipe. For an effective, multisurface clean, use mr. Clean magic eraser. Brand power. Helping you buy better. hard exhalation honey . Can we do this tomorrow . grunts of effort can we do this tomorrow . If you have Heart Failure symptoms, your risk of hospitalization could increase, making tomorrow uncertain. But entresto is a medicine that was proven, in the largest Heart Failure study ever, to help more people stay alive and out of the hospital than a leading Heart Failure medicine. Women who are pregnant must not take entresto. It can cause harm or death to an unborn baby. Dont take entresto with an ace inhibitor or aliskiren. If youve had angioedema while taking an ace or arb medicine, dont take entresto. The most serious side effects are angioedema, low blood pressure, kidney problems, or high potassium in your blood. Tomorrow, tomorrow. When can we do this again, grandpa . Well, how about tomorrow . Ask your doctor about entresto and help make tomorrow possible. Washington d. C. Is abuzz about taxes. This week the president talked about his tax plan on fox news of course. From the podium, Sarah Sanders talked about it, even ivanka trump went to capitol hill to lobby for it. Often mentioned is the extra money that the trump team is promising is going to go directly into the wallets of the american people. Listen to what the president had to say last week with the Senate Finance committee. Each household on average would take in 4,000 and theyll go out and theyll spend that money and that will be great for the economy. Sounds good but is it true . Well, trump didnt come up with the number alone of course. It comes from a report by chief white house economist Kevin Hassett. Well hear from hassett in a moment, but first Larry Summers. Summers was the 71st secretary of the treasury, serving under president clinton. He headed the National Economic council under president obama and was president of harvard university. Larry summers, pleasure to have you on. Glad to be with you, fareed. So you have said in the Washington Post that as treasury secretary, undersecretary, deputy secretary, you have worked for seven chief economists for the white house, and you have never come across an analysis that you described as dishonest in the way that this is dishonest. Explain what you mean by that. Look, the jobs to do economic analysts and different economists will have different perspectives but each of the previous people in the job have taken positions that were well within what professional economists believed and argued regarding the effect of policies. And the claims here that you would see an increase of 4,000 to 9,000 in a typical familys income from a Corporate Tax cut are just outside the range of what the economics professors believes. Even the people who have come down most squarely on Kevin Hassetts side on the oped page of the wall street journal come up with estimates far below the lower end of his range. So hes trying to help the administration politically, i guess. But the analysis is really of remarkably low quality. Thats why i chose to speak so critically of it. Ive written critically and in disagreement with things that the Bush Administration did, various Republican Congressional proposals have tried to do, but the claims that this administration make that the tax cut will pay for itself, that the tax cut will raise incomes more than anything else thats happened in the country in many years, that the tax cut isnt skewed towards helping rich people, those are fake facts and i think they need to be called out as fake facts. Is Corporate Tax reform a good idea . Yes. Will it have some positive impacts . Yes. Are the claims being made by the administration valid . I think not. Is it Corporate Tax reform theyre proposing well designed to help the economy and the middle class rather than be a giveaway to the very fortunate . I dont think it is well designed in that regard. Basically, as i calculated it using some of your analysis, the tax cut if you work it out per American Worker is about 1,300 per worker, and you say Kevin Hassett assumes that when you give 1,300 so every American Worker in the form of a tax cut passed through by corporations, his or her wages will rise by 4,000 or even 9,000. That seems its difficult to understand how that would happen. Yeah, look, i think what Kevin Hassett assumes is that when you give that Corporate Tax cut, youre giving it to corporations and that the corporations in response will decide to grow and that thats what will create the higher wages. The problem is that maybe the corporations will just keep the money and pay it out in the form of higher dividends or doing more repurchases of shares. And even if they do grow somewhat, how much will they grow and in order to finance that Corporate Tax cut youre going to need to do Something Else like borrow money which is going to drive up Interest Rates and have adverse effects on the economy. So the idea that this tax cut is going to be enough to raise incomes by anything like the suggestion seems highly implausible. You said that if Kevin Hassett had submitted his testimony or this proposal to you and he were a student at harvard in an economics course you were teaching, you would have failed the paper. Do you stand by that . Yes, i do. I would have failed the paper because it was egregiously selective in the use of evidence, because it didnt defend the plausibility of its conclusions, because the methodologies were very far from the stateoftheart methodologies in economics, and because professional Economic Analysis is supposed to be analytical and objective rather than constituting a political brief. If i taught a course at harvard in Campaign Management and somebody presented a paper like that as an example of what a president ial Campaign Political document would look like, i might have thought it was a pretty good political document making that case but whats always been special about the council of economic advisers is that it has stood heretofore for objective professional Economic Analysis, not the kind of stuff that campaign staffs produce or white house political staffs produce. What disappointed me about kevins work was not that i had never seen any document like that before but that i had seen them only from campaign or white house political staffs before, never with the im promature of the council of economic advisers. Larry summers, good to have you on. Thank you, fareed. Next on gps, meet the man who wrote the report that says the average American Household will find an extra 4,000 under the trump tax plan. Kevin hassett, the chair of the White House Council of economic advisers, when we come back. Volatile markets. Something we all think about as we head into retirement. Its why Brighthouse Financial is committed to help protect what youve earned and ensure it lasts. Introducing shield annuities, a line of products that allow you to take advantage of growth opportunities. While maintaining a level of protection in down markets. So you can head into retirement with confidence. Talk with your advisor about shield annuities from Brighthouse Financial established by metlife. [notification tone] i love your vest. Your crocheted purses have wonderful eyes. In the modern world, an app can help you find your Perfect Match. And with esurance, coverage counselor® can help you find great coverage thats a Perfect Match too. Thats auto and Home Insurance for the modern world. Esurance. An allstate company. Click or call. In the mirror everyday. When i look when i look in the mirror everyday. Everyday, i think how fortunate i am. I think is today going to be the day, that we find a cure . I think how much i can do to help change peoples lives. I may not benefit from those breakthroughs, but im sure going to. Im bringing forward a treatment for alzheimers disease, yes, in my lifetime, i will make sure. By listening to an thiaudiobook on audible. Ame and this guy is just trying to get through the day. This guy feels like he can take on anything. This guy isnt sure he can take it anymore. Unwavering selfconfidence. Stuck in a 4door sedan of sadness. Upgrade your commute. Ride with audible. Dial star star audible on your smartphone to start listening today. Jimmys gotten used to his whole yup, hes gone noseblind. Odors. He thinks it smells fine, but his mom smells this. Luckily for all your hardtowash fabrics. Theres febreze fabric refresher. Febreze doesnt just mask, it eliminates odors youve. Gone noseblind to. And try Febreze Unstopables for fabric. With up to twice the fresh scent power, youll want to try it. Again and again and maybe just one more time. Indulge in irresistible freshness. Febreze unstopables. Breathe happy. But you know its you, so know this. The activated charcoal in charco caps absorbs gas for fast gas relief without passing the gas. Charco caps, put less boom in the room. Before the break you heard former treasury secretary Larry Summers say why he thought the council of economic advisers analysis of its own tax plan is dishonest. Well joining me now from the white house lawn is the man responsible for that analysis, Kevin Hassett. Mr. Hassett is chair of the White House Council of economic advisers. Thank you so much for joining us. Great to be here, fareed. Thanks for having me. So the heart of Larry Summers contention is that the plan is dishonest because it claims that what amounts to about a 1,300 tax cut that is per worker per household somehow gets magically translated into 4,000 or even more that that by the alchemy of your analysis. What is wrong with his critique and why are you right . The critique is extremely incorrect and the fact is if you think that we did something wrong then you should accuse us of making an error but accusing us of being dishonest is not becoming of a former treasury secretary. But lets get past the attacks and go to the substance. What Larry Summers did, hes on his fifth attack now and each one has been exposed as a horrendous blunder. The first is this point that you raised and the fact is that right now we have a Corporate Tax in the u. S. That has an enormous amount of dead weight loss and doesnt raise much revenue at all because the people are transferring their profits over to ireland, something youve talked about a lot over the years. Right now we get almost no revenue because they create a job in ireland, drive wages up there instead of here. So this idea that you can compare the change in revenue to the change in wages has been exposed as a really critical blunder, economics 101 blunder by john cochran at hoover, by larry cotlakof, people at to have universities that have exposed the fallacy of summers very simple mistake and already a week later youre still talking about it here. Its been exposed as a mistake and youre still asking about it. I dont understand why. Lets go back to the substance of the proposal. None of them believe that the wage gains would be anything close to what you are estimating. Thats false. Why did you say that. Larry cotlakof said its 3600 and we put out a study that estimated the wage impact from a host of studies. You can go back to page 24 of the study. Lets think about why thats not a crazy number. Real wage growth has been almost nothing over the last 8 years. In fact, it was only. 6 while Profit Growth was 11 . Wages come from higher Human Capital formation or higher physical Capital Formation and capital deepening in the u. S. Dropped into a negative territory during the last four years of the Obama Administration for the first time in u. S. History. Were not getting wage growth because we dont have capital deepening because were chasing the capital overseas. This is econ 101. Lets talk about the effect on the deficit. After the reagan tax cuts the National Debt triple. If you look at what happened after the bush tax cuts, massive ballooning of the deficit. Why isnt it the case that these tax cuts will follow the same path and explode the deficit . Lets think about the things that we agree about, fareed, for a minute. You agree, right, that the u. S. Has the highest statutory Corporate Tax rate in the developed world, correct . Most companies dont pay that why dont they pay it . Because theyve moved the profits overseas. There was a National Bureau of Economic Research study that estimated that more than half the u. S. Trade deficit comes from overseas. We have this high tax rate that they dont pay so why does lower the rate to encourage them to return the activity back to the u. S. , why does that cause a deficit . It doesnt. Its illogical. Would you stake your reputation on the notion that this tax cut will not increase the deficit substantially . I have to wait and see before i give a deficit estimate. Theres literature that shows people move the money offshore. If we cut the corporate rate what will happen is capital deepening will go back to. 8 per year and will drive up wages. If you do the math starting with incomes of about 83,000 for the average family, that. 8 per year gets to this number relatively quickly. Once you see that, once you do the math, youre going to see how ridiculous it is what these guys who used to be economists are saying about the ceas activity. Its obvious, very simple math. There are lots of studies that confirm it and the people that are trying to poison the discourse by casting aspersions and so on are just trying to get your attention. I think that youre playing into the korsoning of discourse by giving them the attention rather than focusing on the facts. Pleasure to have you on. Great to be on. Next on gps, the crises in catalonia and the strengthening successionist movements around the world. How should we think about that . Is this a good trend . An important conversation when we come back. Psoriasis does that. It was tough getting out there on stage. I wanted to be clear. I wanted it to last. So i kept on fighting. I found something that worked. And keeps on working. Now . They see me. See me. See if cosentyx could make a difference for you cosentyx is proven to help people with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. Find clear skin that can last. Dont use if youre allergic to cosentyx. Before starting cosentyx, you should be checked for tuberculosis. An increased risk of infections and lowered ability to fight them may occur. Tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms. Or if you have received a vaccine or plan to. If you have inflammatory bowel disease, tell your doctor if symptoms develop or worsen. Serious allergic reactions may occur. Never give up. See me. See me. Clear skin can last. Dont hold back. Ask your dermatologist if cosentyx can help you find clear skin that lasts. Accused of obstructing justice to theat the fbinuclear war, and of violating the constitution by taking money from foreign governments and threatening to shut down news organizations that report the truth. If that isnt a case for impeaching and removing a dangerous president , then what has our government become . Im tom steyer, and like you, im a citizen who knows its up to us to do something. Its why im funding this effort to raise our voices together and demand that elected officials take a stand on impeachment. A Republican Congress once impeached a president for far less. Yet today people in congress and his own administration know that this president is a clear and present danger whos mentally unstable and armed with nuclear weapons. And they do nothing. Join us and tell your member of congress that they have a moral responsibility to stop doing whats political and start doing whats right. Our country depends on it. Crises in catalonia, on friday the parliament voted 70 to 10 to declare independence from spain. Minutes later they gave the Spanish Government broad powers to fire the president of catalonia and take control of the regional government. Much has ensued since of course. This comes as iraqi fights for its own independence as well. What to make of these attempts to break away. A distinguished politician and professional has studied these movements for years. Welcome. Nice to be here. What do we make of this standoff . It appears as though neither side is backing down. Where will this lead . I look at these events with a sense of tragic forboding i have to say, fareed. Its going to require incredible judiciousness and restraint on both sides to avoid civil conflict, and this is a country that has known the horror of civil war. Thats observation number one. So everybody suddenly has to avoid violence, and passions are extremely high on both sides. The second thing is that, yes, they voted for independence but 50 mps walked out, 10 of them voted against, and there are millions of people in barcelona and across catalonia who actually do not want independence. So theres a its almost as if there is a minority of the population, a large minority that wants independence, and actually a majority, almost a silent majority that is extremely reluctant to go towards independence. These are kind of trapped majority. I think thats a source of great concern as well because it may push the independence minority ever further. So both sides are going to have to be very careful. I have a sense, having gone through the bawlen wars with everybody starting to say lets keep it peaceful and they dont go that way. I pray it doesnt but thats my worry. Why shouldnt a country secede or an area within a country . Youre sort of skeptical of these movements but i suppose somebody might ask why is slow serenaveiina allowed to secede . I think the dividing line in those cases is violence. When somebody is kept by force and when theres an imminent risk of uncontrollable violence, mass killing, you can begin to craft a case in that case in which secession, unilateral, simply to preserve the people from destruction or violence or violent death. But in catalonia, youre looking at the most presco prosperous p spain, a place that has powerful desires to preserve language, culture, to benefit automatic to k autonomy here. I speak here as a canadian, fareed, and we went through a near death experience with quebec in the 90s. And the thing we learned about this is there should not be unilateral rights of secession. You have to negotiate the terms of your departure in all circumstances with the state from which youre seeking to exit. Whats broken down here is any dialogue or discussion between the seceding party and the national state, and thats a recipe for conflict, violence and civil war. And you say that the greatest tragedy is that these movements force people to choose an identity, a single identity whereas in fact in life we all have multiple identities. Were both catalons and sp spaniards, we have a religion and a nationality. I fear there are cardinal sins in politics and one of the cardinal sins is to force people to choose between parts of themselves. There are millions of people in catalonia who love catalonia, love the language, love the culture, feel deep attachment to it but do not want to leave spain. They are being asked to cut themselves in two here because a minority is determined to make everybody choose catalonia to the exclusion of all other identities. Thats what i call a cardinal sin in politics. One thing we learned in canada, in quebec theres lots of people whose first loyalty was to quebec, to the french language, to culture, but they did not want to be forced to abandon that part of themselves that had a canadian identity. Thats why we survived, essentially, because people drew back from the brink and said let us not cut people in two. Pleasure to have you on. Pleasure, fareed, thank you. Up next, the mona lisa, the last supper. My next guest calls them the most famous paintings in history. They both come from the same mind, the mind of a man who was also an engineer and inventor. Walter isaacson on the great leonardody vin chee when we come back. Strange . Na. Ever since we switched to fedex ground business has been great. Theyre affordable and fast. Maybe too affordable and fast. What if. People arent buying these books online, but they are buying them to protect their secrets . . hi bill. If that is your real name. Its william actually. Hmph affordable, fast fedex ground. I kept looking for ways to manage my symptoms. I thought i was doing okay. Then it hit me. Managing was all i was doing. When i told my doctor, i learned humira is for people who still have symptoms of moderate to severe Crohns Disease even after trying other medications. In clinical studies, the majority of people on humira saw significant symptom relief and many achieved remission. Humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. Serious, sometimes fatal infections and cancers, including lymphoma, have happened; as have blood, liver, and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening Heart Failure. Before treatment, get tested for tb. Tell your doctor if youve been to areas where certain fungal infections are common, and if youve had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have flulike symptoms or sores. Dont start humira if you have an infection. Just managing your symptoms . Ask your gastroenterologist about humira. With humira, remission is possible. Tired of wrestling with seemingly impossible cleaning tasks . Using wipes in the kitchen, and sprays in the bathroom can be ineffective. Try mr. Clean magic eraser. Simply add water, and use in your kitchen for burnt on food, in your bathroom to remove soap scum, and on walls to remove scuffs and marks. It erases 4x more permanent marker per swipe. For an effective, multisurface clean, use mr. Clean magic eraser. Brand power. Helping you buy better. Benjamin franklin, Albert Einstein and steve jobs are all considered geniuses and Walter Isaacson has written wonderful biographies of them all. Isaacson has now written a book about the original renaissance man, leonardo da vinci. This week it is a treat to hear from isaacson himself on what made leonardo so special. Walter isaacson, always a pleasure to have you on. Thanks for having me back. Lets start with the mona lisa and that smile. You point out that it looks like it might just have been casually done. This was very painstakingly done over years with a lot of study. For 14 years he worked on that smile and its the most amazing combination of art and science because leonardo has dissected the human face. Hes looked the every muscle and every nerve that touches the lips and whether the nerves come from the brain or spinal cord and even figures things out like you can move the bottom part of your lip alone but not the top part. All these things. He also has dissected the human eye and he realizes at the center of your retina sees detail. The corners of your retina see shadows and light. So when he paints the nemona li smile, its almost augmented reality because the tiniest details of the lips turn down but the shadows turn up. If you look at the cheeks or forehead, the smile lights up. Its an interactive thing that shows interemotion. This is to me why its a culmination of everything he did. You talk about how he would write down in his notebooks the things he wanted to learn, and there was an almost childlike curiosity. He says why is the sky blue. He asks all these fundamental questions that children often ask. We outgrow our wonder years. We see the blue sky in the morning and forget to marvel at it. We forget to say why do people yawn, and worse yet, we probably knock that curiosity out of our kids, say, oh, quit asking questions. Leonard leonardo, just like einstein who also in his notebook wrote why is the sky blue. So thhe wanted to know everythi that could possibly be known about the universe, including how we fit into it. It was such a noble endeavor but it was also one that he found fun. He was an engineer by training. Do you think he thought of himself as somebody who was a scientist . How did he think of himself . First of all, he probably would not have made that much of a distinction between art and science or between beauty and engineering because hes putting the copper ball on that dome in the florence cathedral. Thats a work of beauty and engineering. A selfpour trait of himself standing naked in the circle in the square, thats science and art connected. Explain the science in that. You know, in vetruvian man he is trying but hes got two friends who are also doing it, to do the exact proportions of man. If you look at his notebook, theres more than 230 measurements of the knee to the ankle, the chin to the lip, exactly how it works. So its a work of brilliant science. But unlike his friends who sort of do it as a chart, he does the work of unnecessary beauty. The shading, the beauty of the man standing there, and it was partly to get the proportions of a church right. So theres a very spiritual quality to it and then a personal quality because thats him standing on earth and in the universe saying, how do we fit in. Do you think there is this common theme in your books that you search for genius and try to understand it . I think i search for creativity. I try to say what is it, how do we achieve it. In this book and in leonardo da vinci, i try to disstill from his life and steve jobs and Albert Einstein. Here are lessons about how to be curious, more observant, be more open to wonder and take notes on paper which is something they all did and we should probably go back to occasionally. To me we know all these smart people but smart people often dont amount to much. Its the creative person, the innovative person. I started with henry kissinger. It was the balances that he was able to figure out and a way to recreate a world order. But especially a ben franklin or steve jobs and einstein. And the ultimate in Creative Genius is leonardo. Walter isaacson, always a pleasure. Fareed, thank you. Next on gps, 1600 pennsylvania avenue has had some unconventional residents throughout its history and im not talking about the occupants of the oval office. Ill explain what i mean when we come back. Full of superlatives, both real and imagined. Here are some of the true ones. He is the oldest person elected president , the wealthiest, the first without any prior government or military experience and hes the first president in the modern era not to own a pet. This brings me to my question. Who was the last president to serve a full term in Office Without a pet at the white house . Benjamin harrison. Calvin coolidge, Woodrow Wilson or james polk. Stay tuned and well tell you the answer. This week i have a movie for you and not a book. Its a fascinating one. The navishiate is about a 17yearold nun who tries to make sense of her world as vatican ii transformed the Catholic Church forever. I dont think you understand what this would do to us. If we were to truly embrace all these changes, it will ruin the very institution of catholic nuns. We see what those grand shifts meant to the ordinary women who were the churchs back bone, the nuns. It is a beautiful, elegant, deeply personal and intellectually stimulating movie directed lie a talented young woman, maggie betts. Run, dont walk to see it. The answer to my gps challenge question this week is d, james polk was the last u. S. President to serve a full term in Office Without any pets at the white house. Since then the white house has been home to a veritable managery. Woodrow wilson kept a flock of sheep on the white house lawn. Calvin coolidge had a pet raccoon named rebecca and Teddy Roosevelt kept dozens of beasts including guinea pigs, dogs, horses, a badger and a blue macau. Donald trump need not fear a petless legacy. Many president s receive their animals as gifts. Barack obama received his first dog bo from ted kennedy and the Washington Post reports that a florida philanthropist has already offered President Trump a Golden Doodle puppy named patton. Thanks to all of you for being part of my program this week. I will see you next week. Hey, im brian stetler. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and wornld tld. This is reliable sources, our weekly look at the story behind the story of how the media really works and how the news gets made. This hour, a watershed moment, Sexual Harassment finally getting the attention it deserves. These men in some cases losing jobs. But are journalists playing catchup. Plus ill talk with two reporters about whats really going on